Tag Archives: DFW Airport

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No lawyer had more direct impact on the North Texas economy than Ray Hutchison, from airports to rail lines to stadiums (Tom Fox/Staff Photographer)

Everyone leaves a legacy, but not everyone’s is remembered. Ray Hutchison’s legacy is more than that. It’s so pervasive that it’s part of everyday life in North Texas, and that’s quite something.

If you fly into or out of Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, you benefit from the airport that Ray Hutchison helped build. Same if you ride a Dallas Area Rapid Transit train. Or need care at the new Parkland Memorial Hospital. Or have been entertained at Arlington Stadium, The Ballpark in Arlington, Texas Motor Speedway, Gerald Ford Stadium at SMU, Reunion Arena, the American Airlines Center, Texas Stadium, AT&T Stadium.

Hutchison was a state legislator and Texas Republican Party chairman in the 1970s, then the husband and consigliere of a U.S. senator. All noteworthy accomplishments, but we should remember him first for what he did for a living, which was becoming the top public financing bond attorney in Texas.

That may not be the sexiest pursuit, but consider what might not have risen from the ground without a guy like Hutchison to figure out how to pay for it.

Now comes my favorite transportation department with good news about clearer signage to help LBJ Freeway drivers reach DFW Airport without confusion.

I got this email from TxDOT spokesman Tony Hartzel, who passed along an internal update on the big green airport signs I had been asking for. (Notice how he buttered me up right off the bat):

Thanks again for your keen insight into the needs of North Texas motorists.

From the DFW Connector office:

“The signs are up. There are three – one on each of two permanent overhead signs prior to the DFW Airport exit from IH-635, and one on the exit sign at the gore to DFW Airport.

Please note these signs are only going to be on the IH-635 exit to DFW Airport, and not any other direction or highway.”

Yesss. This means that a tired old brain like mine won’t have to work so hard navigating from the rebuilt highway configuration into the airport. The DFW Connector project changed things around, and I got thrown off course a few times by signage that wasn’t as clear as I needed.

I wasn’t the only one, judging from emails I got. Glad to see TxDOT take another look at this one.

If only it were true that using your TollTag made it quicker and earlier to leave D/FW Airport. (Tom Fox/The Dallas Morning News)

Usually, I’m inclined to complain when one of my brilliant, masterstroke “Hits and Misses” ideas fails to make it past my scrutinizing colleagues.

Sometimes, it’s for the best.

A few weeks ago, I thought we should offer praise to Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport for doing what I’d bitched and moaned about for some time, which is increase the number of TollTag lanes to pay for parking.

My lament went something like: “Jeez, they want you to use a TollTag to pay, but then they jam TollTag users into a couple of lanes way over on the side or make you wait behind the guy trying to dig a quarter out of his seat cushions.”

So the recent switchover to way more TollTag lanes than the other kind should have been good news, right?

The new system still uses NTTA’s TollTag. But Magana said D/FW’s sensors now process on-site several pieces of information — including calculation of the fee, verification of the TollTag and checking for TollTag fraud. And that takes time, he said.

“It’s doing a whole bunch of things,” Magana said

Magana said he couldn’t explain why D/FW picked a system that now takes longer to do — from the driver’s perspective, at least — the same task.

“That’s a systems integration question, and I don’t have a lot information on that,” he said. “All I know is that there’s a lot more going on with the TollTag readers than there was before.”

How then does the new, slower system allow drivers to “breeze through,” as promised on D/FW’s website?

Magana said that even if each, automated transaction is taking a few seconds longer, the airport now has the capability to keep open all the lanes in the entry and exit plazas. He said that should better distribute traffic — and keep waiting times to a minimum.

“We can now process a lot more cars,” he said.

Be still my heart. It sure doesn’t seem that way at ground level.

I feel a little guilty here because I convinced my lovely wife to cut through the airport the other night for the $1 pass-through charge. (We had to run an errand in Euless, and once on the other side of D/FW, we were nearly home in Flower Mound.)

“Lots more TollTag gates,” I promised. And there were, except they didn’t seem to work. Entering on the south side, we were made to take a ticket, which seemed odd for a TollTag vehicle. “Don’t worry,” I reassured. “We’ll work this out on the north side.”

Oh, yes. We sat at the TollTag gate. And sat. And sat. Finally, some guy ambled up and demanded a credit card. “We have a TollTag,” I hollered from the passenger side. He pretended to not understand. “Why won’t it read the TollTag?” I shouted. “Hey, man!” This was followed by a torrent of bad words, followed by me thrusting a Mastercard at the guy. He ran it, the gate lifted, and we were on our way, poorer but wiser.

My wife, of course, must now check with NTTA to make sure the goofy TollTag readers don’t still think she’s at the airport. Guys, no “hit” for you.

I asked for big green signs with the international sign for “airport.”

So TxDOT spokesman Tony Hartzel called just now, and he began our conversation with this: “Good news.”

The news was this: “There is agreement among the engineers on the project that adding signage is appropriate.”

Does that mean I was right?

“Your keen insight made us aware of the issue,” Hartzel deadpanned to me.

That’s probably the closest he could get to “OK, you win. We’ll put up your blasted signs.”

Notice he said I made them aware an “issue,” not a “problem.”

My confusion in approaching DFW Airport stems from years of entering the north entrance from westbound LBJ. The road bent around smoothly to the south and funneled you right to the gates. There were no ramps to negotiate, no real distractions.

But the huge DFW Connector project changed everything. The LBJ driver from Dallas sees ramps galore, exit and entrance both, and my eyes don’t pick up the cues from the signs early enough. Despite concentrating real hard, I’ve gotten screwed up more than once and ended up Fort Worth-bound. Ugh!

And I’m not the only one, having heard from a number of irked motorists.

Hartzel pointed out that my LBJ-to-DFW route does have “three large signs” pointing the way to the airport. None bears the big green airplane, though, and now two of those will be added.

“A little more is appropriate,” he said.

The OK from the traffic engineers came Monday — just in time to shut me up about anything untoward I might say about the Connector. Today is a big day for the project. A couple hundred officials gathered in Grapevine to ballyhoo its completion. (See Tom Benning’s coverage.)

This is a monster project, and it’s amazing how they could build that many bridges and lanes in that short a time.

Wouldn’t it be a shame, though, to spend a billion dollars and send unwitting airport customers halfway to Cowtown instead.

Expect the green signs to be installed sometime in October, Hartzel said.

Like almost every American who has squeezed into an undersized airline seat, I have flown into DFW Airport. Dozens of times. Each year, 57 million passengers go through the airport. But as I drove toward it last week to pick up visitors, I realized I had never once driven in and out of DFW.

Now, there are some things for which I’m obsessive. And getting to the airport on time is one. So I had decided to make a test run the night before I needed to be there, just to make sure I could find it, see how long the trip would take, and get a feel for the airport’s layout.

I drove in using I-635, and although it was a bit confusing, I managed to get there. Thank you, GPS. But I’m not a huge fan of GPSing because you end up mesmerized by the seductive voice that implores, “Make a U-turn in…two…hundred…yards.” And it keeps you from learning how to get around.

So, I turned it off as I began the return trip. And really, I figured, how could I miss a mass of asphalt and concrete about as wide as the Mississippi?

I followed the sign inside the airport that directed me to the north exit, which, it promised, would lead me to Dallas by way of I-635.

After paying to leave the airport (first time, by the way, I’ve ever paid for the privilege of simply driving in and out of an airport – I didn’t park or even stop), I drove toward I-635. Or so I believed.

I drove and drove. Lots of construction, but no sign of I-635. Or any signage that would help me figure out how to find it. I finally took the first familiar-sounding exit and…ended up someplace that had topless club after topless club.

The next day I was in the office when editorial columnist Jim Mitchell stopped by, trying to be sociable to the new guy.

“So how are you finding your way around?” he asked innocently enough.

“Pretty well in Dallas,” I answered. “But I tried to get to the airport last night and…”

Jim’s eyes lit up. He began divulging nightmarish stories of airport trips gone astray while using the dreaded north access. I heard pain and trauma in his voice. This from as measured a man as you’ll ever find. Another colleague, Rodger Jones, heard the discussion as he walked by. He stopped to offer his laments. But being the transportation guy on the editorial board, Tod dug deeper.

“Where did you turn off?” he asked.

I began telling him my tale of adulterated woe.

“You lost your faith,” he finally concluded. “You turned one exit too soon. If you had kept going, you would have hit the 635.”

“You’ve got to use the south access,” yet another colleague, Tod Robberson, tossed out as he walked past the door and heard our spirited gripefest.

And that’s precisely what I did, coming and going, the next night. And it was a piece of cake. Got in, picked up my visitors, and got out.

But the north route issue had struck a nerve. How can it be, I wondered, that one of North Texas’ greatest resources could be so hard to maneuver?

So two days later, when I had to return to DFW, I again took the south route to get there. But after I dutifully dropped off my passengers and we exchanged tearful goodbyes, I headed to the north exit, jaw set and mumbling something under my breath about faith lost. Did I mention I have a tendency toward stubbornness and obsession?

I paid at the tool booth and left, resolutely searching for that big river of concrete and asphalt. I drove. And I drove.

Maybe I was emotional about saying goodbye, or became distracted at the wrong moment. It was late at night. But next thing I know, I’m on 183 and the lit-up Dallas skyline is on the horizon.

The next day I saw Rodger and told him the story of my travel travails.

“Where did you turn?” he asked.

“I didn’t…” I maintained.

“Oh…” he smiled. “You took the…”

Felt like Groundhog Day a few days early.

I know that Rodger, Jim and I can’t be the only ones who’ve gone through these frustrations. If you’ve had similar experiences using the NORTH access, let me know. Or just tell your story below.

And don’t wait too long. I’ve got a visitor coming in next week.

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